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To: waverider who wrote (105438)	9/23/2001 11:40:34 PM
From: Jon Koplik	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 152472

Two Barrons letters to the editor "caught my eye." Jon. *********************** Barron's September 24, 2001 Mailbag Day of Infamy To the Editor: Thomas G. Donlan's idea of rebuilding the World Trade Center is not a good idea. Morally and politically, it sounds right, but the cold, hard reality is different. It is the second time this complex has been hit. Please take a look at the history of the Opera House in Belfast, which is the emblem of repeated terrorism, bombed/rebuilt/bombed/rebuilt/bombed/rebuilt. You may not like it, but there is a clear message there. A rebuilt World Trade Center will be a lightning rod for further attacks by its very existence. It's financially imprudent and far too dangerous for its occupants. The MGM Grand Hotel loss in Las Vegas transformed property and liability risk management in its day. This one will, too. Nobody will ever view skyscrapers the same after this. Nobody thought this could happen. People thought fire could be limited to three to five floors with people evacuated up or down from there. People thought these buildings would survive airplane collision or major fires like this. All of that is changed now. Rebuild all around the WTC for sure, but take the site of the two towers and do something entirely different with it. If nothing else, make it a memorial park with a piece of sculpture as magnificent as the Wall at the Vietnam War Memorial. If you cling defiantly to rebuilding the WTC, you defy madmen to prove to you that they can destroy it again. If you think creatively, New York City can be on the leading edge of how cities build their urban core in the future. It will need to be much different than we have built in the past. Cameron Chandler Whidbey Island, Washington ************************* To the Editor: I think the terrorists showed us conclusively that the President's pipe dream for a missile defense system would just end up being a $100 billion Maginot line in the sky. With $2 worth of razor blades and 18 men willing to die, they hurt us deeply. Technology will not save us from the likes of them, but perhaps Madison Avenue will. I suggest we take a large chunk of that $100 billion and jam our culture right down their throats. My idea is simply this: We identify the fundamentalist regions of the world, and then with massive airdrops we shower them with icons of American culture. I am thinking of Hershey bars with almonds, Coca-Cola, Playboy magazines, comic books, Cracker Jack, bubble gum, Tastykake cakes and pies, female contraceptive devices, and thousands of small one-channel transistor radios. We will broadcast rock and roll around the clock to these devices. I know it sounds puny, but if we litter the streets of their cities with these products, they will not be able to resist. They will become addicts of the American way, and they will not be willing to throw their lives away for heaven when they can taste it in their lives daily. They will demand more and more products. They will hoard and trade the products we give them, and so capitalism will overtake their souls. Eric Rothwarf Philadelphia Copyright © 2001 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved.